


If this is a blunder

by maurascalla



Category: Fortysomething, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Crossover, F/M, M/M, Minor Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-05
Updated: 2012-04-05
Packaged: 2017-11-03 02:10:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/375932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maurascalla/pseuds/maurascalla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rory Slippery falls in love. It's that simple.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If this is a blunder

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thanks to my dear and lovely friend, [Cher](http://zheeer.tumblr.com/), for betaing this for me. Title from Love You Madly by Cake.

After about a week, Rory finally admitted to himself that his and Daniel’s flat was kind of a waste of money. Estelle and Paul spent more time there then they did. He and Daniel spent every night at the old house anyway. Rory sighed. Living with your parents wasn’t really so bad, was it? 

“Yeah, it is,” Edwin said when Rory asked him. 

“It kind of is,” Woj agreed, scrunching up her face. Rory looked between them and sighed. He’d been doing that a lot lately. He wondered it if was all part of growing up, sighing at a progressively accelerated rate. If his parents were anything to go by, then yes, yes it was. This thought caused him to sigh again. 

“Stop sleeping here, mate.” Edwin shrugged, like it was the simplest thing in the world.

“Well, maybe we would if Paul and Estelle weren’t getting off in our flat every night.” Daniel mumbled. He had on his tie and his work shirt, but no pants. They were sitting at the kitchen table waiting for the kettle to go off for their morning tea. It was a weekday, but Edwin and Woj were still wrapped up in Edwin’s bed sheets. 

“Are you going to school today?” Rory asked, because someone should. 

***

Half of the time at work Rory couldn’t tell his co-workers from the homeless. Side Street’s employees worked on a strange rotating schedule, which meant Rory might work with one person one day and not see them for many weeks afterwards. This also meant that Rory was constantly introducing himself not only to new homeless in search of help, but to other staff members as well. That being said, though he still had trouble telling the homeless and his co-workers apart, he could definitely tell a police officer when he saw one. 

This particular cop was tall, not as tall as Rory himself, but he still cut an imposing figure. He had the kind of salt and pepper hair Rory’s father had been trying after for years but had never accomplished. He was rather dashing in the kind of understated way many men in their forties wished they could be. His tie was hideous.

“Can I help you?” Rory stepped in the cop’s path, blocking his way down the hall. He was holding a tray of salt and pepper shakers, but he tried to look menacing over the dented mental lids. They weren’t supposed to let people just wander into the building. There were sign-up sheets and things that were meant to be filled out first. The amused twitch of the man’s mouth told Rory he had not succeeded in his attempts. He supposed he looked rather like an annoyed puppy. At least, that was what Laura always said when he tried the same look on her. 

“Yes, I’m Detective Inspector Lestrade and I was hoping to find James Fuller around here somewhere,” Lestrade – and Rory was actually rather glad to have a name for the man; calling him ‘cop,’ even in the privacy of his own head, felt a tad disrespectful – said, trying to peer over Rory’s shoulder. 

“Why?” 

“He’s not in any trouble,” Lestrade said. “I just need to ask him some questions about a friend of his. Won't take a minute.” 

Rory gave Lestrade a calculating look before nodding. “Just let me put these down,” he wiggled the tray of salt and pepper shakers, “and I’ll help you find him.” 

Ten minutes later found Rory staring down at the attendance roster, flipping through it over and over. Jim had signed in but he wasn’t in the building, and none of the other guys had seen him all day. And now that Rory thought about it, he hadn’t seen his favorite tramp in almost a week. Though, he had been working the early morning shift lately, and Jim didn’t tend to come in until much later.

“Thanks anyway, kid,” Lestrade said, turning for the door. 

“Rory.”

“What?”

“Rory Slippery,” he said, feeling that, for some reason, this man ought to know his name. “Not ‘kid’.”

Lestrade looked back at him, his head tilted slightly. “Thanks, Rory Slippery.” 

***

“Woj, do you ever go home?” Paul asked, his brow creased with confusion. Rory rolled his eyes. At some point his father was going to realize the only people in the whole of London who didn’t live in his house were Estelle and Paul themselves. 

“My parents are on holiday, Mr. Slippery.” 

“Yes, but that doesn’t explain why you’re at my dinner table every night.” 

Estelle sighed. “Paul, darling, why don’t you pass along the peas?” 

Dinner at the Slippery house had become an incredibly cramped affair. Rory and Laura, Daniel and Lucy, Edwin and Woj, plus Paul and Estelle. It was busy, loud, and they were able to quickly defer Paul’s attention elsewhere. 

After all, the peas were very good. 

***

Rory wondered, as he brushed his teeth before bed, if maybe he just wasn’t ready to be away from home. He also wondered if he would ever be allowed to find out, what with his parents shagging in his apartment every night.

Spitting into the sink, he wondered where Jim was. 

Rinsing his mouth, he wondered if Edwin was using a condom. 

Whipping at his face with a possibly clean wash cloth, he wondered what his chances of getting laid that night were. 

***

Turned out, they were pretty good. 

***

Later that same week, while Rory was making a house of cards during his lunch break, Lestrade ambled into Side Street’s rec room. 

“Mr. Slippery,” he said formally.

“Detective Inspector.” Rory nodded, an ace of diamonds in one hand and a six of clubs in the other. Lestrade pulled out the chair opposite of his across the table, careful of any bumping or scraping that might cause Rory’s masterpiece to crumble. “What can I do for you?”

“I found Mr. Fuller.” Lestrade frowned and his eyes went soft. “I’m afraid he passed away.”

Rory blinked, the playing cards between his fingers fell to the dingy folding table. He’d never known a dead person before. Except for Knobby, but he’d hardly known the man. He wasn’t sure how he felt about it. There was no immediate sense of dread or overwhelming sadness. He was, however, incredibly shocked. 

“Oh, God,” he breathed, rubbing a hand over his face. Rory had seen Jim just a week ago. He was lively and loud and just so classic Jim. Rory had never once considered, in all his months of friendship with the man, that he would one day be without him. That particular brand of surprise was still novel when he heard himself ask the other man how it happened. 

“Mr. Fuller was napping in an alleyway a few nights ago, and died in his sleep. A stroke,” Lestrade said, not unkindly. Rory blinked.

“Does he have any family, or-?” 

“I was rather hoping you could tell me.” 

Rory wracked his brain, trying to think of any family Jim may have mentioned. He came up short. And if that wasn’t the saddest thing he’d ever heard, Rory didn’t know what was. He let out a shuddering breath. “I can’t think of anyone.” 

Lestrade nodded, making to stand, but Rory flung out his arm to stop him and, in the process, knocked down his house of cards. Playing cards fell to the floor.

“What’ll happen to Jim?” Rory blurted out in a rush. 

“He’ll be cremated and buried in an unmarked grave unless his body is claimed,” Lestrade said, straightforward and honest.

“Give me a few days. I’ll find somebody.” 

“We’ll be looking as well, you know.”

Rory smiled. “You lot can’t possibly have the means I’ve got can you? I work in a homeless shelter.” 

“Point,” Lestrade said. He shoved his hand into his jacket pocket and pulled out a business card. “Call me if you find anything.”

“Likewise.” The two men watched each other for a moment before Rory’s mobile went off. He held up a finger to Lestrade while flipping open his phone with his other hand. 

“Hel-” he started to say, but was interrupted by a loud pair of intimate groans. Lestrade raised an eyebrow. Rory saw red. “Excuse me,” he said to Lestrade. “I have to go murder my brother.”

“I don’t mean to pry, but are you actually got to murder your brother? Because as an officer of the law, I can’t say I recommend it,” Lestrade called after Rory, who was already out of his seat and halfway out of the room. 

“Oh, yes. I’ve kept my axe and everything.”

***

“Daniel!” Rory roared, flying up the stairs. He pounded on his brother’s bedroom door. “Open this door, Daniel!”

“Rory, calm down.” Paul said hurriedly, coming up behind him. 

“Shouldn’t you be at work?” Rory asked, momentarily distracted by Paul’s presence. Paul’s face wrinkled with worry like he was trying to remember something he’d forgotten. It smoothed out again, and he smiled. 

“No, it’s Tuesday. I don’t work on Tuesdays,” he said with confidence. 

“Good for you.”

A deep, guttural groan erupted from Daniel’s room. Rory kicked the door as hard as he could. 

“Rory, there’s someone here for you,” Edwin called from down stairs, near the front door. “I’m sending him up.”

“No! Edwin-” Rory turned, about ready to fly back down the stairs, and came face to face with Detective Inspector Lestrade. “How-”

“You left without this.” He said, holding out his card. “Also, you sounded like you might actually hurt someone. I just thought I’d make sure you didn’t do something stupid.”

Rory stared at him like he was having trouble believing he was really there. He sighed and plucked the card from the other man’s fingers. 

“I’m sorry, who are you and why are you in my house?” Paul asked, stepping up beside Rory in what Rory was sure Paul thought was a protective fashion. Actually, he just looked ridiculous, his eyes bulging and his mouth set in a thin line. Rory rolled his eyes. Laura cried out from within Daniel’s room. 

“Good Lord!” Lestrade said, jumping slightly. 

“They’ve been going on like that for ages.” Edwin leaned on the railing, looking up at the trio of men loitering outside of Daniel’s bedroom door. Woj stood on the step below, her expression sullen as usual. “Just about all day.”

“Edwin!” Paul said, just as Rory slammed both fists against the door between him and his prick of a brother.

“Lucy’s in there too, you know,” Woj added, because she’s anything but helpful. Rory paused in his assault of the door.

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. You should’ve been here earlier when-”

“Woj!” Paul interrupted. The girl stopped speaking immediately. “Why are you here anyway? Shouldn’t you two be in school?”

Rory tuned them out, ignoring his brother’s transparent excuses and his father’s general lack of sanity. His brain had come to a standstill. He found that he wasn’t even mad anymore. Not really. He felt an allover sort of numbness. He also found himself oddly impressed. 

“What has gotten into that boy?! It’ll be Woj next, at this rate,” Paul said absentmindedly. 

“You couldn’t pay me, Mr. Slippery.”

“Hey, that’s what you said about me!” Edwin looked at her, hurt. She shrugged.

“I guess we’ll see then, wont we.” There was a moment of silence before Lestrade cleared his throat. Rory had forgotten he was there. 

“Since you’re not imbedding an axe into anyone’s skull, I think I’ll just leave,” he said, pointing to the stairs with his thumb. “Call me if you get anything.” Rory nodded, distracted. 

“Who the hell was that?” Paul wondered again when Lestrade had let himself out. Rory sighed. 

***

Rory spent that night alone in his and Daniel’s flat, forcing his parents to have sex in their own house for once. It was a cold, lonely sort of night in which Rory had plenty of time to get spectacularly pissed and think about where his life was going. Nowhere, and fast. He was twenty, wonderfully healthy and completely unhappy. Rory went to sleep hoping the world would look a little brighter in the morning. 

It didn’t. 

Daniel was sitting in his own bed across from Rory’s with the girls, waiting for him to wake up. 

“Laura thinks we should talk,” Lucy said, with Laura nodding beside her. 

***

When it was all said and done, Daniel ended up with the flat, the girls, and all of Rory’s dignity. Armed with his belongings, Rory moved back into his childhood home. Estelle watched him from the kitchen with sad eyes. 

“I’m so sorry, darling,” she said, holding her arms out for a hug. Rory stepped into it willingly. 

Work was tedious, and proved to be an even more depressing atmosphere than home when he asked around about Jim’s family. Turned out, the man had no one left. It was just him and those comfy library chairs at the end. 

“Can you ask around? Tomorrow, just in case?” he asked a couple of different guests, desperately. They nodded, some of them with more intent than others. Jim was generally a really nice guy, and Rory hoped they could find someone, anyone, who would claim him. 

***

That night, when everyone at home was snuggled into their beds, Rory let himself be depressed. He wasn’t really angry with Daniel anymore. He was disappointed that he let himself think that this time it would be different. Things at the Slippery residence never change. They only get more ridiculous. 

***

Three days later, on his day off, Rory was having a bit of a lie-in when Edwin burst into his room, Woj hot on his heels. They flung themselves onto his bed, waking him from a very restful sleep. He grunted. 

“We think you should open yourself up to new possibilities,” Edwin said with an air of maturity that he hadn’t earned. “Go out and find yourself a new girl.”

“I’m sorry if it’s taking me a while to get over my little brother stealing my girlfriend.” Rory blinked. “Again.”

“It’s time to get back on the horse, mate,” Woj said. 

“I am not going to take dating advice from sixteen year olds who –” Rory checked his alarm clock “– should be at school!”

Edwin shrugged, and jumped off of his brother’s bed. He and Woj left, exchanging irritatingly knowing looks. Rory sighed, rolled over, and prayed silently for death.

***

There was literally no one left in the whole world who seemed to care that Jim the Tramp had died, except for Rory Slippery. He pinched the bridge of his nose. 

Detective Inspector Lestrade’s business card felt heavy and ominous in his hand. He dialed the underlined number quickly, but carefully, being sure to press all of the right digits. It rang three times before going to voice mail. 

“Hello, D.I. Lestrade? This is Rory Slippery, from Side Street,” he said awkwardly. “Um, I couldn’t find Jim’s family, but I was wondering if I could have a word regarding his remains. Um. I’m at work. I’ll just ring you later then, shall I? Alright, bye.”

Rory felt so drained. He wondered when his life turned into a bad soap opera. Probably when he was fourteen, and Daniel stole his pornography. There was something of a pattern there, but Rory didn’t want to look at it too closely. 

Giving Lestrade’s card one last mournful look, he shoved it back into his pants pocket. Rory sat up a little straighter. He still had work to do. Those salt shakers weren’t going to fill themselves after all. 

***

Rory was seated at the dinner table, tucking into a plateful of his mum’s cooking, when Lestrade rang him back. His phone jingle cut into one of Paul’s rants. Something about traffic cones and why did Edwin have them plastered to the walls? 

“’Lo?” Rory asked, his mouth full of potato. 

“Rory Slippery? It’s Detective Inspector Lestrade. I’m returning your call about Mr. Fuller.”

“Oh! Hello! Yes, I was wondering if I could claim the remains?” Rory said, ignoring the circus that was his family dinner. “I could give him a proper funeral. Well, better than nothing at all, anyway.”

“It isn’t typical, but I’ll see what I can do. Can I call you back?” Lestrade said with a sigh. “Sometime tomorrow?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.”

“Alright, then. Bye.”

When he flipped his phone closed Rory looked up and found every set of eyes on him. 

“What was all that, then?” Daniel asked, one arm looped across the back of Lucy’s chair. Laura sat on his other side. 

“One of my friends died. He didn’t have any family left, so I’m going to give him a sendoff,” Rory said.

“Oh, Rory! Who was it?” Estelle asked, eyes wide and full of compassion. 

“Jim, from work.”

“What, one of the homeless men?” Paul wondered, obviously puzzled. Rory glared. “Oh, right. Of course. Sorry.”

“That’s very admirable of you, darling,” his mother said with a smile. Laura nodded along in agreement. Rory gave them a tight smile. A bit of ash scattering and a few kind words. Not really that big of a deal, in his opinion. 

“Yes, this is all well and good, but why are there stop signs attached to the front of my house?” Paul asked in that bewildered tone of voice that was the sound track to Rory’s entire existence. Estelle rolled her eyes. 

“I told you, it’s a social experiment.” Edwin smirked. 

Rory finished his meal with a smile on his face. 

***

“Mr. Slippery, hi,” Lestrade said, darkening the doorway into the office at Side Street. He held a small bag in his hands. “I, ah, brought Mr. Fuller for you.”

“You didn’t have to do that. I was going to get him after work,” Rory said, standing from the swivel chair. They’d talked earlier that day about Jim’s remains, and Rory just assumed that he could get them before quitting time at the morgue. He didn’t think that Lestrade would hand deliver them. 

“Eh, I was in the neighborhood,” Lestrade said with an easy charm. He smiled, walking forward with the bag held out in front of him. “Here he is.”

Rory took the bag and marveled at how tiny it was, in comparison to Jim himself, who hadn’t been a particularly small man. “It’s so little,” he said before he could think better of it. He flushed with embarrassment. To his surprise, Lestrade didn’t laugh. In fact, his smile widened. 

“I was rather hoping,” Lestrade began after a moment of silence. Rory had been staring intently at Jim’s ashes. They were gray and not nearly as sandy as he had imagined. “That you would invite me to the service.”

“Oh, yes! Of course!” Rory grinned. “Next Saturday, at noon. At my house. Er, do you remember where that is, or-?”

“I remember.” Rory raised an eyebrow, but didn’t comment.

When Lestrade left, Rory watched him go, pulling at his upper lip, deep in thought. 

***

When Estelle and Rory got home that evening, Woj and Edwin had set fire to the kitchen. Rory set Jim down on the island so he could help Paul beat the fire into submission while the others splashed water on it. 

“What the Hell,” Paul thundered, “was that?!”

“Calm down, darling. I’m sure there’s a perfectly good explanation for this. At least, there better be.” Estelle stared her son down in a way Rory hadn’t seen for ages. Not since he was little and Daniel put a hole in the sitting room wall with Rory’s axe. 

“We were just trying to make cookies for the funeral,” Woj said. Edwin nodded, wide eyed. They looked down at their feet. 

“Well, it doesn’t look like there’s going to be any lasting damage,” Rory declared, inspecting the oven. It, and the wall, looked a little scorched, but nothing a little elbow-grease wouldn’t fix. 

Estelle sighed. “We’re getting takeaway tonight. Edwin, Woj: go get cleaned up. We’ll deal with this mess in the morning.”

“That should be the family motto.” Edwin laughed as he and Woj made a swift exit from the kitchen. Rory silently agreed. 

***

Friday morning came quicker than Rory had anticipated. Before he knew it, he was knee deep in homeless guests and unhelpfully helpful family members. By eleven-thirty there were cases of beer and soda out on the lawn next to a table full of fruits and biscuits. Rory stood next to them feeling very proud of himself. All of Jim’s friends had shown up, and half of the Side Street staff. He had almost every second planned down to the last detail. 

“Hello, Detective Inspector,” he said with a wave at the older man climbing out of a taxi. 

“Please, don’t call me that, Mr. Slippery. I’m off duty.” 

“Well, in that case, call me Rory.” They smiled at each other for a moment before Rory remembered himself. “Oh, have a biscuit! My brother made them, but they’re actually kind of alright.”

Lestrade picked up a biscuit and looked at it closely. “The brother that you were going to murder with an axe, or the other one?”

“The other one. And his girlfriend. Made a mess of the kitchen the first go around.” 

“I’ll be sure to pay my compliments to the chiefs.” Lestrade plopped the treat into his mouth and crewed. “This isn’t half bad.”

“We’re about to start, if you want to, I don’t know, mingle or whatever.” Rory pointed to the group of men and women loitering around a tub of beers in ice. Lestrade nodded and wondered away. Watching him go, Rory found himself wondering why the man was here. He didn’t know Jim personally. He was just a guy who might have known a guy who might have helped with an investigation. It was sweet of him to come. 

As Rory turned to head back into the house to grab Jim’s ashes, he bumped into Lucy. She spilled a soda down his nice white shirt. It was cold, and it felt very unpleasant sliding down his chest. “Ah!” he yelped. “Shit.”

“Sorry, sorry!” Lucy called after him as he ran through the front door. He needed to change his shirt, immediately. He couldn’t stand in front of all of those people wet and Coke stained. 

“Rory, where are you going?” Estelle asked, passing him in the entryway. 

“Got to get changed. Could you grab Jim off the table for me?” He didn’t wait for an answer. He was already halfway up stairs. 

After smelling all of his shirts- they were all on the floor in varying states of unclean -he chose a purple one he couldn’t remember buying. It must have been one of Daniel’s that got mixed up in the washing. It hung a little loose against his body, and he hoped no one would notice. 

Estelle handed him Jim’s remains on the front porch, and he carried them down the steps and onto the lawn. It felt a little light. He lifted the bag up higher, and his heart stopped. Nearly half of the ashes were gone. From the crowd gathered around the refreshments, Edwin let out a shout. Woj, threw the biscuit in her hand onto the grass. “Edwin, you said that was flour!”

Rory’s heart started back up again about the time his brain caught up to the party. “Everyone! Drop your biscuits!”

Confused, people dropped their biscuits back onto their little cardboard plates. “What’s all this about then?” Paul asked. 

“We might have, accidentally, baked Jim into the biscuits,” Edwin said sheepishly, hiding behind Woj. Paul paled. Estelle gasped. One of the homeless men ate the rest of his biscuit. 

“What? ’Swat Jim woulda wanted.” The man said defensively when Rory gave him an alarmed look. He shrugged, grabbing another. Woj wrinkled her nose. “Just get on with it. I’ve gotta be at the shelter in an hour.” 

Rory sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. 

“Jim,” he started. “Was a very decent man.” 

***

In the end, they scattered what was left of the ashes in the front yard, just along the bushes. The funeral winded down, and soon the only people left were the Slippery’s, a few Side Street employees, and Lestrade. Rory stared down at the pile of dirt and Jim and thought that he would’ve enjoyed this party. He was a fan of the absurd, Jim. 

“Great service.” Lestrade came up behind Rory, his hands in his pockets. “Really moving speech.”

“Don’t have a go at me. It was terrible,” Rory replied. It was. It was awful. He hadn’t known anything about Jim that wasn’t incredibly superficial. The one thing he hadn’t planned in advance was his speech. He’d figured the words would just flow from him, organic like. Obviously, that was not the case. Not to mention, he’d unintentionally fed his guests human ashes. That had been a little unsettling. 

“Why did you give Mr. Fuller a funeral, if you didn’t really know him that well?”

“I did though, just not very in depth, I guess you could say. I saw him constantly, and we always had fun talking to one another. I never realized until today how much someone can say without really saying anything,” Rory said. “Besides, everyone deserves to be remembered when they go. This was the least I could do.”

Lestrade tilts his head to the left, as if considering Rory for the first time. “Most people wouldn’t go this far out of their way. It was very kind of you, even if your brother did bake him into a desert. Which I ate.” He shuddered. 

Rory buried his face into his hands. “Ach, don’t remind me!” 

Laughing, Lestrade rested a hand on his shoulder. “I can’t wait to tell my Sergeant about this. She won’t believe it! Ashes don’t even look like flour. What was he thinking?” he said.

Rory let out a strangled sound he hoped conveyed his complete inability to explain his brother. Lestrade laughed again. 

“Thank you for letting me come,” he said, turning to leave.

“Welcome,” Rory mumbled through his fingers, face still buried in shame. “It was nice to meet you.” 

“You too, Rory. Take care.”

***

Two weeks after Jim’s funeral, Lestrade turned up at Side Street again. Rory watched him walk into the rec room behind Andre, one of his co-workers. He wondered who was in trouble. 

“Slippery, you’ve got a visitor,” Andre said, making his opinion of Lestrade clear. A lot of the people working at Side Street were distrustful of police officers. Rory didn’t exactly know why. Estelle had always told them growing up that police officers were the good guys, and that you could always trust one. 

Rory was aware that many of the people he worked with found him to be a naive fool. He was startlingly okay with this. 

“What can I do for you?” Rory asked after Andre had left. Lestrade shuffled his feet. 

“I was in the neighborhood, and I was wondering if you were going on break anytime soon.” He smiled nervously, but with charm. He had an easy charisma about him.

“About five minutes from now, why?”

“Would you like to get coffee with me?” he said, adding, “in five minutes.”

Rory cocked his head to the side. “Are you asking me out on a date, Detective Inspector?”

“Er, maybe?”

Lestrade fidgeted for a moment under Rory’s gaze. His face was a little pinker than usual, and Rory found it to be vaguely endearing. What the hell, he thought. Why not.

“Let me grab my coat.” He said.

***

“So, let me get this straight.” Lestrade took a sip from his cup before continuing. “Your brother is dating both of your ex-girlfriends. Who are sisters. At the same time.” 

“Yes.”

“Cor.”

“I know.”

“No wonder you were going to swing an axe at him.”

Rory smiled. He was having a nice time. He might be asking for a second date, if Lestrade didn’t ask first. 

***

Two Wednesday’s after Lestrade asked him to coffee, Rory found himself in the unique position of having the Slippery house all to himself during the day. Edwin was at school, and his parents were both at work. Daniel was God knows where, which suited Rory just fine. 

He rang Lestrade, and told him to come over. 

Rory was a classy sort of man. He waited until the fourth date before inviting Lestrade to bed. Well, in a sense. That would be their fourth date; sex in Rory’s bed. 

“Blimey,” Lestrade said when it was all said and done. “Haven’t done that in ages.” 

“Me either.” Rory admitted, though probably more recently than the other man. Lestrade didn’t get a lot of free time outside of work, and Rory found himself feeling rather flattered that he took the time off for him. He smiled, and Lestrade grinned back. 

“Lestrade-” 

“Greg, please. I had my hand on your cock only a minute ago. No reason to be formal after that.”

“Greg,” Rory said, trying the name on his tongue. “Greg.” He shook his head. “It’s no good. I like Lestrade better.”

Lestrade laughed. “You are something else, Rory Slippery.” 

“Thank you. I think.”

They stared at each other for a minute, and Lestrade’s smile faded. His face took on a more serious expression. 

“You do realize that I am nearly twice as old as you are.” He said, eyes roaming Rory’s face. Rory’s brow furled.

“Yeah, I might’ve picked up on that at some point.”

Lestrade sighed. He touched Rory’s cheek, and leaned over for a kiss. It was sweet and closemouthed at first, but Rory moved his lips about until Lestrade got the picture. It got heated very quickly. Unfortunately, that was when Edwin busted into Rory’s room.

“I need to borrow your axe- oh my God!” Edwin stood in the doorway, without Woj peeking over his shoulder, for once, his eyes wide as saucers. Rory pulled away from Lestrade, who jerked Rory’s sheet up his chin. 

“Why?” Rory asked crossly. 

“You know,” Edwin said, ignoring the question. “When we said you should broaden your horizons, we didn’t mean you should pull the crypts keeper.”

“Oi!” Lestrade shouted. 

“Get out!” Rory made a sweeping gesture, meant to mimic shutting the door. He looked like a mad man, his hair shag-wild, arms flailing about. Edwin smirked. 

“No need to get stroppy.” He said, holding his hands up defensively. “I was only joking.”

“Ha-bloody-ha. Now go.” Rory pointed to the exit. Edwin waved cheekily, slamming the door behind him. There was a moment of absolute silence. 

“I’m no truancy officer, but shouldn’t he be in school?” Lestrade asked, and Rory laughed. He kissed him once. Twice. Three times, before hoping out of bed. 

“I fancy you, you know?”

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” Rory pulled on his pants. “I know it’s sort of soon, but would you like to have dinner? I mean, to say, with my family?”

“You’re quite right,” Lestrade said, putting on his clothes. “It is rather soon.” 

Rory’s face fell. “Oh, right. Of course. Sorry.”

“I didn’t say ‘no’.” Lestrade pointed out, walking through the rubbish piles littering the bedroom floor. He stopped in front of Rory and touched his face. Lestrade was constantly touching Rory’s face. He didn’t know how he felt about that yet. A thumb rubbed along his cheekbone. “I’ll think about it, okay?”

***

The “yes” came a week later, after Rory stayed the night at Lestrade’s flat.

***

Sitting around the kitchen table, Rory watched his family eating their breakfast. It had been about a month since he and Lestrade had started seeing each other, and he was bursting with happiness. Best split second decision of his life. 

“I’ve been seeing someone,” he announced, because there wasn’t going to be a better time than now, and he wanted to start organizing The Dinner. And maybe make Laura, with her just-got-out-of-bed-after-a-fantastic-night-of-shagging hair, a little jealous. She was bringing it on herself really, sleeping over at the house when she and Daniel and Lucy had a perfectly good apartment just down the road. Though, he couldn’t really blame them. Paul and Estelle had taken to stealing the flat over nights again. 

“Oh?” Estelle prompted. “What’s her name?”

“Greg.” Rory said. “Lestrade.” 

There was a moment of silence before Woj scrunched up her nose. “What, that man who came to Jim’s funeral? He’s ancient!” 

“He’s not that old!”

“I don’t know, brother. He’s kind of old.” Daniel smirked, his arm around Laura’s chair. Lucy sat on his other side. 

“But handsome,” Estelle said firmly, eyeing her son. 

“I’m sorry. When did you become gay?” Lucy asked, her eyebrows pushed together. Rory rolled his eyes. “Because I remember when we-”

“That’s enough, dear, thank you,” Estelle cut in, raising a hand to silence her son’s girlfriend. Lucy quieted down immediately. Rory shot his mother a grateful look. 

Paul sighed and tipped his head back. Rory waited for his father to weigh in on the situation. 

“Edwin, why is there a blow up doll on the ceiling?”

“I told you-”

“I invited him to dinner,” Rory interrupted what was sure to be a stellar explanation. Paul frowned, as he was wont to do when anyone abruptly changed the subject. 

“Wonderful! When?” Estelle asked. 

“Either Thursday or Friday,” Rory said, ignoring the kissy faces Edwin was throwing his way. Daniel giggled. 

“Thursday would be lovely, darling.”

“I can’t do Thursday. I’ve got a thing.” Edwin said. 

“What kind of ‘thing?’ You’re sixteen years old, you can’t have ‘things’,” Paul asserted. Edwin shrugged and wouldn’t answer. Rory sighed. 

“So, Friday then,” he said. 

And it was settled. 

***

Lestrade was exactly three minutes early. Rory would mock him a little for that, except he’d been waiting at the door for ages. He opened it before the other man could even ring the bell. 

“Steady on,” said Lestrade, amused. Rory didn’t flush, but only because he was in a rush. He pushed Lestrade back out the door and on to the porch. Following behind, he shut the door as quietly as possible. 

With a weak sort of smile, Rory gave Lestrade a kiss. 

“While you’re in there, please remember that you like me.” 

“You people’ve already fed me human remains. What could possibly be worse than that?” Lestrade laughed. “You worry too much, Rory.”

***

“- and this is Lucy, Daniel’s girlfriend, and Laura, Daniel’s other girlfriend.” Rory announced, making introductions. They were the only people Lestrade hadn’t met at the funeral. They smiled prettily at him. 

“Pleasure to meet you,” Laura said. 

“Yeah, a pleasure,” Lucy echoed. 

Lestrade smiled faintly. “Hello.”

“So, Greg, what do you do for work?” Daniel said awkwardly. Rory wanted to die. 

“I’m a Detective Inspector at Scotland Yard.” He replied, taking a sip out of a glass of water Estelle had brought for him. Rory could see the tensed line of his shoulders. This was such a terrible idea. 

“Oh, how interesting!” Lucy simpered, bouncing in place. For a moment, Rory wondered what he ever saw in her. One look at Lestrade said that he was thinking much the same. 

“Keeps me on my toes.”

“Is that why you’ve got so many gray hairs? Because your job is so stressful?” Lucy asked seriously. Rory closed his eyes in the hopes that when he opened them that whole night would’ve been a bad dream. A horrible bad dream of his own design. Why did he think this was a good idea? When he opened them again, everything was just as he left it: Lucy, genuinely curious; Laura and Daniel, embarrassed; and Lestrade, standing there with his mouth set in a firm line and his eyebrows raised so high they were disappearing into his hair line. 

“Actually, I dye it specifically so I look more dashing,” he said, his eyes glinting. Rory looked at Lestrade, and he felt his heart burst with adoration. 

There was nothing like a partner who could cut down an ex with really trying. 

***

“The meal was lovely, Mrs. Slippery. Thank you,” Lestrade said, tucking his napkin under his plate. Dinner had been over for some time, and they’d progressed into tea and chit chat. It was when the tea cups came out that Daniel and his girlfriends left, swiftly followed by Edwin and Woj. Tea-with-the-girlfriend was serious business in the Slippery household. Even when the girlfriend was a man nearing forty. 

“Oh, thank you,” Estelle said with a smile. It was sharp and calculating. Rory knew what came next. He’d sat through (or listened in from the vent connecting the downstairs to the upstairs. He was sure that was where Woj and Edwin had gone, listening in from the upstairs.) this same interrogation a few times before. “What do you do outside of work?”

“How do you mean?”

“Hobbies? Interests?”

“What my wife,” Paul interrupted, “is try to say is, do you make a habit of luring significantly younger men into your bed, or is our son just special?”

There was a moment of complete silence. Rory groaned. “Dad! That’s rude, you shou-”

“No,” Lestrade interjected. “It’s a perfectly reasonable question.” He straightened his shoulders and looked directly at both of the elder Slippery’s. “I don’t typically date younger men. I don’t typically date men at all, if we’re being honest here. In fact, I haven’t dated anyone else since my wife and I split up.” 

Rory sat back in his chair. He hadn’t known any of this. Not that it really mattered. Lestrade was Lestrade, and Rory was Rory, and they fit together like crayons did in their little cardboard boxes. Not perfectly, but well enough. 

“So yeah,” Lestrade continued. He looked sideways at Rory with a smile. “Your son is special.”

Rory flushed happily, and put his hand on Lestrade’s knee under the table. Estelle had to wipe a tear from her eye. 

“Well, that’s that then, isn’t it?” Paul said, rubbing has hands together. “Now, how about you tell us about that mass suicide thing we heard about on the telly last week.”

Estelle shot Rory an approving glance over Lestrade’s head as he explained to Paul that he couldn’t talk about police business outside of work. Rory smiled back. 

That night, he went home with Lestrade. 

“Did I pass, do you think?” he asked in the taxi, his arm around Rory’s shoulder. 

“Yeah, I think so. Estelle definitely likes you. Paul’s a little harder to read. He’s just so-”

“Insane?”

“Yeah, that.” They had a bit of a laugh. When the taxi pulled up to Lestrade’s building they got out and Rory paid the driver. “Thanks,” he said, smiling. He could see himself reflected in the man’s glasses. He looked content.

***

That night, as he brushed his teeth before bed, Rory wondered if it was possible to die from happiness. 

***

Turned out, it wasn’t. 

***

Rory woke up late one morning, and made himself a cup of tea. It was cold, so he threw on a coat over his dressing gown. When his Earl Grey was done he carried it outside. 

There was frost on the ground. Rory’s feet, daftly bare, were frozen by the time he’d walked from the front door to the bushes where he’d tossed Jim’s ashes nearly four months ago. 

“Hey, Jim,” he said, taking a sip of his tea. “How are you? Actually, you can’t answer that so never mind. Sorry I asked. Anyway. I just wanted to thank you. For dying, I guess. Um. For dying where you did and when you did, specifically. I’m sort of stupidly in love, and it’s all thanks to you.” Rory took another sip of tea. 

He watched the ground for a moment, staring deep into the icy grass. He smiled, and poured a little of his tea over the remains. 

“So anyway. Thank you. For everything, mate.”

Rory went back inside and got ready for his day. He was working the afternoon to night shift at Side Street. Then later, after work, he was going to a late dinner with Lestrade. 

Edwin was sitting at the kitchen table when Rory went to put his cup in the sink. He was dressed in an ill fitted suit, putting together a puzzle.

“You should be in school,” Rory said, assuring that everything was as it should be in the universe.


End file.
